I really don't like Twilight.
Alaska is a land of almost unparalleled beauty. A land that has an undeserved reputation as being one of exclusively icy, treacherous tundra as far as the eye can see. If one looked past the miles of pure, driven snow and took in the fresh scent of the pine trees, the spectacular mountain views, and the faint but clearly visible image of Russia that can be seen from the governor's mansion...even a heart completely hardened to beauty would be moved to tears.
Edward Cullen reflected on this whenever he was in the area, wondering if he couldn't fully appreciate the true beauty of Alaska because his heart had hardened to the point of lifelessness. Staring across the Bering Straight from the balcony of the governor's mansion--he was an acquaintance of the governor of Alaska, and was welcome at her residence whenever he was in the area--he sighed and chalked it up to his own personal sense of melodrama.
Perhaps it wasn't his non-beating heart that stunted his perception of beauty. Perhaps it was because the scenery paled compared to his very ideal of beauty. The very idea of Bella Swan brought a smile to his hardened, ice-cold lips, before he once again sighed at the emptiness inside him whenever they were apart.
His week-long retreat to Juneau was drawing to an end, and the anticipation of seeing Bella again was overwhelming. Nervous energy filled him. He had to work it off somehow, Edward decided. But how?
Edward attempted to swallow, but found no moisture in his mouth to do so with. He smirked. Thirsty again. I think I can occupy myself.
He turned and opened the sliding glass door, stepping inside the mansion, where one of the governors' maids was busy at work tidying with a feather duster. He caught her eye, and she simpered nervously. "Mr. Cullen," she said, a slight stammer in her voice. "Y-you're leaving so soon?"
Edward silently laughed--partly at her manner, partly at being addressed as "mister." The effect he had on women had become a private joke between he and Bella. At the memory of his beloved, his nervousness renewed, and he balked at being delayed. "I'm afraid so. I'm quite hungry, you see."
"Why not stay?" the maid asked, practically pleading with him. "I'm sure the governor wouldn't mind having you as a guest for brunch."
"Thank you, no," Edward replied, casually strolling to the door. "I'm feeling rather particular today."
"Are you sure?" entreated the maid. Curious, Edward stretched out with his mind and flipped through her thoughts--then very quickly retreated, suddenly wishing he hadn't. So...indecent.
But he turned, smiled blandly, and said "Quite certain. Believe me when I say that I'd prefer to go out to eat. But thank you for the kind invitation."
And keep your fornicating thoughts to yourself, missy.
It hadn't taken Edward long to find a quarry once he'd entered the woods. He'd caught the scent of a timberwolf, and was now chasing the dog down with aplomb. He entertained the fantasy that he was chasing down a certain upstart Quileute boywolf (growth spurt or no, Jacob Black was certainly not a man in his eyes) as he bounded gleefully after it.
His target came closer, closer, ever closer, and as the wolf entered a large clearing, Edward prepared to lunge for the kill--
BANG!
The wolf jerked. Its legs gave out from under it, and it skidded several feet before crumpling on the ground, perfectly still. Blood oozed from an open wound in its head. Edward ground to a halt several feet behind it and stared, chagrined, at his now-dead prey.
True, it had taken him minimal effort to track and chase the wolf. Nevertheless, he'd taken time out of his day to chase down a beast--for the benefit of the population of Juneau, lest his bloodlust consume him and he feed on some poor human--and some upstart human comes along and takes it out with a gun?
"Sorry," a voice called from the trees. It was scratchy, raspy--as if its owner was a heavy smoker. Carlisle would rap his knuckles. "Was that one yours?"
Edward turned his head to his right, and appraised the man that emerged from the trees. He was quite tall, and solidly built at that. Well-developed muscles bulged from every inch of what seemed to be a skintight unitard. Were it not for the belts, pouches and ammunition clips that adorned his body, Edward might have assumed that the man was a gymnast.
A gymnast who carried a high-powered sniper rifle.
Edward narrowed his eyes. How very curious.
"That seems a bit much for a simple hunting trip, no?" he called back to the stranger, gesturing at the sniper rifle.
The man shrugged. "I felt like a little overkill." He stepped deeper into the clearing. "Whatever 'it,' happened to be; I wasn't actually hunting anything specific. Thanks for scaring that thing out for me, by the way."
"It wasn't for you," Edward said, straining to keep his voice polite. This man bothered him, and he couldn't quite place why he did. "Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to have a moment alone with the dead animal."
The man shook his head. A blue-green bandana--the same color as his unitard--fluttered behind him as he did. "I got the kill. By rights, it belongs to me." His eyes seemed to flash as he said this. "You'd best leave it at that, kid."
Edward scowled. This man was certainly big for his britches. He stretched out with his mind once more, hoping to comprehend just where his overinflated sense of self-worth came from--
"I'D GIVE MY LIIIIIIFE/NOT FOR HOOONOOOOOR, BUT FOOOOOR YOOOOUUUU (SNAAAKE EATEEEER)"
--and quickly cut the connection with his mind. What was that--that horrible noise? he thought to himself. The song--that bombastic, barely-qualifying-as-music-song--seemed to be the only thought in that man's head.
Solid Snake's face was an emotionless mask, but inside, he glowed with pride at his mental discipline. "You're not the first psychic to have tried perusing my thoughts. This time, I came prepared."
Get your own damn Castlevania save data.
The vampire across the clearing from him seemed aghast. "How did you--"
"Because I know who you are," Snake said, eyes narrowing. "More importantly, I know what you are."
Yet Edward seemed unsatisfied by this explanation. "But...but how do you?"
Snake grimaced. He'd have to exposit, would he? The thought of expositing to this perpetual pubescent almost drove him to drop his mental defenses and let Edward read his mind. But the urge lasted only a moment.
"I know everything about you," he continued. "I know your name. I know about your family. I know about your little sweetheart back home." Edward's face darkened at this mention. "
"And I know every little thing you're capable of," Snake finished. He raised the PSG-1. "And I'm not impressed."
He fired--once, twice, a third time, in quick succession. Bloody holes blasted into Edward's torso. His body jerked reflexively as the bullets struck him, but he remained standing and showed minimal signs of pain. Rather, Edward seemed annoyed. Very, very annoyed.
The vampire snarled, roared, and rushed at Snake. Even though he saw it coming--even though he knew what Edward was--Snake still wasn't prepared for the speed at which he'd moved.
And then the punch connected with his stomach, and then he was soaring through the air, finally smashing--hard--into a tree trunk, which splintered, but didn't break, upon his impact. Snake skidded to the ground, dazed and moaning.
Yeah. The kid was definitely a little perturbed.
Snake recovered his wits just as Edward rushed at him again, mouth wide, fangs glimmering in the faint sunlight.
Wait--sunlight?
The faint ray that reflected off of Edward's teeth quickly grew as the sun burned through the cloud cover above them and illuminated the clearing. The vampire halted, a horrified look washing over his face as his skin shone, glowed--sparkled.
Snake couldn't help himself. He laughed.
"Stop it!" Edward yelled, face twisted with fury.
Snake laughed harder. "I said stop!" Edward repeated, but with a note of desperation. And this, of course, only made Snake laugh ever harder.
Edward quivered with rage, screamed in anguish, and threw a punch straight at Snake's head. The soldier stopped laughing and jerked his head aside before the punch could connect. Edward's punch rammed into the tree trunk, pummeling straight through it. The tree fell forward, directly over where Snake and Edward were poised.
Snake rolled to the side out of danger. Edward caught the trunk and effortlessly tossed it away, where it landed several yards away at the edge of the clearing. Snake clambered back to his feet and braced himself as Edward came at him once again.
This time, he was prepared. He narrowly evaded Edward's first punch, weaved under his left hook, and gave him an uppercut to the jaw--the very punch that had defeated Liquid.
Except there was no three-story drop to send Edward hurtling to. And the punch, though it was certainly effective, hurt Snake's hand more than it seemed to hurt Edward's jaw. But Snake followed up by retracting his arm, drawing his elbow back, and smashing it into Edward's throat.
The coup de grace came, as Snake pivoted on his back foot and, relying on momentum and leverage just as much as raw physical strength, pounded Edward in the chest with his right leg. Pain shot through Snake's extremities as each blow made contact, but the effect was undeniable--Edward stumbled backward several feet, and fell flat onto his back.
Right where Snake wanted him.
The large man's blows had certainly hurt Edward far more than he'd anticipated. Being a vampire, he'd naturally assumed that he was completely invulnerable to any and all human attacks. Carlisle would be interested in hearing about this encounter.
But Edward was still intact, whereas the human was now contending with a damaged back and pain in his right hand, elbow and leg. The human had hurt him--there was no denying--but he was still standing.
Figuratively speaking, anyway.
Edward connected with the ground. He was already anticipating his next move, when he felt a smallish, square box pressing into his back. What is--
And that's when he noticed the detonator that the man had pulled from a pouch on his belt, the devilish gleam in his eye, the grim satisfaction etched onto his face--and before Edward Cullen could react to this, the man pressed the switch on the detonator, and the C-4 beneath him exploded.
There was nothing civilized inside of him at that moment--no thought, no reason, no emotion. No eloquent, intelligent rationale. Not even his passionate love for Bella. At that moment, Edward's very being was composed of nothing more than pure predatory vampiric instinct.
Wounded, agonized, but still alive and functional, the vampire staggered back to his feet. His back had been blown apart; nevertheless, he stood tall--battered and completely feral. The vampire was angry, and he had no further reservations about making this man his meal.
Snake stood aghast as Edward climbed back to his feet, amid the roaring flames that the C-4 had left behind. Plastic explosives couldn't kill the punk? What the hell was that all about?
That was his entire thought process, before Edward came at him again, all traces of civility and reason void from his being. He charged at Snake, shoulder lowered, ready to bowl him over and smash him to pieces.
But an orange and blue blur quickly interposed itself between Edward and Snake, catching the feral vampire and holding him tightly at arm's length like a lineman.
This development perplexed Snake. "Gray...Fox?"
The ninja whipped his head around, regarding Snake with a single, eerily-glowing mechanical eye in the center of his stark facemask. "A name from long ago," his electronically-altered voice hissed. "It sounds better than Deepthroat."
Snake threw his hands up in confusion. "What the hell is going on? Fox, what are you doing here?!"
"You look terrible, Snake," Gray Fox said wryly. "You haven't aged well."
Snake rolled his eyes and pressed his palm to his face. "Damn it, Otacon..."
Edward roared, clearly upset that he was no longer the focus of the narrative. Gray Fox whipped his head back to the vampire and gave a hard push. Edward flew backward, catapulted by the cyborg ninja's unexpected strength.
Edward managed to regain control of himself mid-air and landed on his hands and knees semi-gracefully. He smiled crookedly;his brief flirtation with ferality had ended and his senses were back with him. "I didn't realize that this was a tag-team event," he taunted.
The ninja, whom the man had identified as Gray Fox, gave no reply. Edward frowned, concentrating. Perhaps the new arrival's mind would yield more than the angry, ballsy man's had.
There was nothing. Just a faint, static-y crackle of electronic interference. Edward was perplexed. "Curious," he murmured. "You don't seem to have any thoughts."
Gray Fox remained silent. Edward went on. "I suppose the absence of thoughts makes you technically other than human--'I think, therefore I am,' you know. That being the case, I'm sure you wouldn't mind if I killed you and glutted myself on your blood."
Still no reply. Damn. The bluff hadn't worked. "Or maybe I'll just rip off your own arms and beat you to death with them," he offered.
"..." was the non-reply.
"Can't you talk?!" Edward roared in frustration.
"Hand-to-hand is the basis of all combat," Gray Fox said in his unsettling electronic voice. "Only a fool trusts his life to a weapon."
Edward sighed, exasperated. This was going nowhere.
His head snapped back as something punched him across the jaw. Nowhere good, anyhow. Edward hadn't even seen Gray Fox move. Yet the ninja had crossed the space between them and punched him in the face in the blink of an eye.
It didn't stop there. Gray Fox delivered a flurry of lightning-quick jabs and kicks to Edward, forcing him further and further back. Edward numbly tried to fend off the ninja's attacks to no avail; Gray Fox moved with a fluidity and grace that was far beyond any vampire that Edward had ever encountered.
Edward was still on the defensive, taking more and more punishment with each step backward he took. Nothing, human or vampire, was as strong or as fast as this. And it was in no danger of slowing down.
Something licked at Edward's ankles--something airy and wispy and hot as hell. Blisteringly so.
The ninja halted its assault, and Edward was suddenly, terrifyingly, aware of where it was he was standing, and what had licked at his ankles. The blaze left behind by the C-4 burned hot and bright behind him.
Gray Fox wordlessly drew the sword that hung over his back. Edward's face contorted with fury, and he roared one final time, pinning all of his hopes, and indeed his very survival, on one final punch.
Edward's fist swung.
The sword flashed upward with imperceptible speed.
Gray Fox cleaved through Edward's right arm, and the limb fell uselessly into the fire. He swung the blade twice more, severing his left arm in his first stroke and both his legs with the second, before bringing the blade to Edward's neck and shearing through that with ease. The limbs dangled in midair for a moment, before the ninja batted each and every piece of severed Edward into the roaring flames behind him.
All this Snake watched, completely at a loss for words.
Gray Fox turned, sheathed the sword, and regarded Snake with his single ocular receptor. "Snake," he said. "We're not tools of the government, or anyone else."
The world around them began to dim. A perceptible hum built in the background of the clearing. Gray Fox went on. "Fighting was the only thing...the only thing I was good at, but at least...I always fought for..."
His voice gradually slowed and lowered in pitch. "...what I...beeeelliiiiiieeeeved...."
The clearing vanished into blackness, and Gray Fox with it.
Solid Snake stepped out of the VR simulator to a beaming, anticipatory Otacon. "Well?" the scientist asked brightly. "How was it?"
Snake glowered at his best friend silently. Otacon's wide smile collapsed a little. "Did everything go alright in there?"
"Oh, it was fine," said Snake sarcastically. "Right up until the part where Frank Jaeger appeared and cut the damn vampire into ribbons for me."
Otacon frowned and tilted his head. "I thought you wanted--"
"I did want Edward Cullen dead. That's not the point." He sighed and rain a hand through his thick brown hair as his annoyance ebbed. "What I'd wanted was to do the job myself. I didn't want a dead ninja to jump in and pull my ass out of the fire because the going got tough."
Otacon folded his arms skeptically. "Snake, he was kicking your--"
"I wanted it to be realistic," Snake said, cutting Otacon off. "Taking some lumps for the sake of realism is fine by me. That's one of the problems with your VR system."
Otacon removed his glasses, cleaning them on his shirt. "I put Gray Fox in there as a fail-safe, Snake," he said, trying to exonerate himself. "Since there was every possibility that you'd wind up losing the fight, I wanted to spare your ego the damage."
Snake grunted inaudibly. There was some merit in Otacon's words, but the frustration of an unfinished fight still gnawed at him. His stomach growled. Or maybe I'm just hungry.
"I'll let it go for now," Snake sighed. "But next time--"
"Yeah, yeah, I know," said Otacon. "You still got what you wanted though."
"That I did." The ridiculous novel danced in his mind, taunting him with its pretentious cover, its bland characterization, its muddled, unclear plot and, worst of all...the sparkling.
"Damn Twilight."
Because, yes, it's possible to pick up a Stephanie Meyer novel, read it, and not think that it's the Great American Novel.
And yes. I read it. Cover-to-cover. I read the second too. And I'm reading the third. Guess what? I still don't like it.
If you're going to hate on something, hate on it because you're familiar with it and don't like it, rather than hating on it based on hearsay.
That is all.